The date has been scheduled for the Northridge Optimist Club 33rd Annual Scholarship Scramble golf outing. The event is a fund raiser for Northridge area youth activities and scholarships. The date is Friday, September 23, 2016.CLICK HERE to download a pdf file of a​ "Save the Date" flyer for printing or e-mailing.

Registration and sponsorship information will be available in the coming weeks, so watch this Bulletin Board for more announcements.

Scheduling Note:Please note a recent change in the schedule (see below).The meeting of February 16 is cancelled.The program that had been scheduled for that meeting has been rescheduled for May 17 (see the schedule below).

Update of Feb. 16:

Muse Machine Event:In lieu of the regular club meeting on Tuesday, February 16, several club members attended a 3rd grade class Muse Machine program at Morrison Elementary School. Our members were invited since this was made possible by a grant from the Polar Bear Fund which our club supported. It was held at 9:30 AM at the school, and was well attended by parents and friends. It was directed by the Muse Machine Elementary Program Resident Artist Michael Lippert, whose elementary program creates curriculum-based art integrated into classroom teaching.

Michael Lippert (center) and Lynn Wood (right) at the June 23, 2015 meeting.

He worked with the students for several days to produce a student written program which emphasized reading. Over a hundred enthusiastic third graders responded with a spirited and enjoyable speaking and singing performance on the subject of "text features". Mr. Lippert commended and thanked the students for their dedication, cooperation, and creativity. He also thanked the teachers for their commitment to the program.

Mr. Lippert and Muse Machine Director Lynn Wood had spoken at our June 23 meeting last year, leading to our club recommending the use of a Polar Bear Fund grant for the school. Below is a slide show from the event. ​

Meeting of February 9:

• The speaker was Ken Betz, Director of the Regional Crime Lab, and Director of the Montgomery County Coroner's Office. His presentation was fascinating, and he covered a lot of territory, from the technology used in the crime lab, to the scope of the operations of the coroner's office. ​

The coroner's office employs six full time forensic pathologists and processed over 1700 autopsies last year. He discussed some of the current trends in the causes of accidental deaths, the main one being the high incident of drug overdoses. The most recent trend is a vast increase in deaths from fentanyl, which is 20 to 30 times more powerful than heroine. Other synthetic drugs with thousands of time more potency than heroine are now becoming a threat. Ken's forty-some years of experience in the office was evident in his fine presentation, and he took time for some additional questions from the members.

• Laura Engel of United Way was also a guest at the meeting. She informed the club about United Way's "Read On Book Drive". The 2016 Read On Book Drive is collecting new books for low-income Pre-K to 3rd grade children with a goal to expand to all 21 Dayton Public elementary schools, providing 85,000 books to all the Pre-K to 3rd grade students there. They have already collected 60,000 books, and the goal is to raise the funds for 25,000 more. These books help students reduce summer slide and maintain their reading skills over summer break. In May 2015, United Way of the Greater Dayton Area distributed 27,000 books to 2,700 Pre-K to 3rd grade students in 10 Dayton Public Schools. Each child got to choose 10 new books to take home with them for the summer. To see how to donate books, see the United Way website: http://dayton-unitedway.org/news-and-events/read-on-book-drive/​

Pass/Shoot/Dribble Contest:

The next club event is our sponsorship of the annual Pass/Shoot/Dribble basketball skills contest for elementary school kids. This will be held in the Northridge High School gym. The date is Saturday, March 12. The event information and application are available on this website. See thePass/Shoot/Dribble page under "Activities". ​

Essay Contest:

A date has been set for the presentation of the club level awards for the 2016 Optimist Essay Contest. The students's will be judged this month in order to submit the winning essay to District competition. The winners of the club level contest will be announced, and awards given out, at our club meeting of Tuesday, March 15 which will be held at Northridge High School. For more information on the contest, and a report on last year's awards, see the Essay Contest page under "Activities".

Community Links:

Some links of interest to the Northridge area are posted in the panel at the right (see the red buttons under "Other Northridge Links"). They are for The Northidge Alumni Bear Facts website, the Northridge Schools website, and the Northridge Schools facebook page. One good way to show support of the community is to patronize the alumni businesses that are listed on the alumni website: http://www.northridgealumni.org/id11.html.